大象传媒

For 40 years, John Doubleday has been encapsulating in bronze some of the history's most significant and influential people.

The Maldon-born sculptor, who lives and works in Great Totham, has immortalised world leaders such as Nelson Mandela and Golda Meir and cultural icons such as The Beatles and Laurel & Hardy.

Working with wax to develop ideas is vital

His work can be found as near as Maldon's Promenade Park, Billericay and Chelmsford and as far afield as Fiji, Beijing and Colorado.

But with every new commission, John says he is looking to improve on the last one.

A compulsion to create

The seeds for John's remarkable career were sown at a very early age, whilst on a family holiday to Norway.

"I stayed with friends of my parents who knew Michael Cardew, who was a very distinguished potter," he recalls.

"While I was staying with them - I did nothing but play with clay and Michael said to me 'you ought to be a sculptor when you grow up.' I've never really thought of anything else and I haven't really done anything else really."

Statue of Graham Gooch in Chelmsford

After studying at Goldsmiths College, John exhibited his first show in 1967 and has not really looked back since, producing both private and publicly commissioned work all around the world.

John believes that unlike some vocations, sculpture is something innate rather something that can be instilled.

"It can be taught," he says hesitantly. "But what makes people want to create is an inner urge.

"The arts have a sort of compulsion about them and you can't teach that. I think you can just about stamp it out of people if you really try, but it's not something which is taught.

"I think it's probably as much a symptom of intellectual or emotional insecurity and restlessness and a desire to explore and 'do stuff'."

"It's a document which arises out of personal experience, so in years to come gives an inclination of what that person was actually like to meet," he explains.

"I spend quite a lot of time with a person trying to persuade them that I'm not trying to 'do a job' on them, but I need their trust so that they will disclose their personality and be happy to be seen for what they are."

John uses his sculpture of former Israeli Prime Minister Gold Maya as an example of how spending time with his subject helped him find a different perspective.

"She was hilarious - so funny," he remembers.

John's Beatles sculpture in Cavern Walks

"She was completely surprising to me, because you'd think 'she's a tough old thing, people said she was the only man in her cabinet', but actually I was completely won over by her.

"One very surprising thing was, though she wouldn't say she was a good-looking woman, she was actually quite extraordinarily feminine."

Holmes where the heart is

Not all of John's sculptures have been of living people and in some cases they have never lived at all. So when it comes to sculpting a fictional character, such as Sherlock Holmes, John says thorough research is needed.

"All members of the [Sherlock Holmes Appreciation] society are absolutely certain what he looks like. But of course they've all got different ideas about what he looks like," he jokes.

"Conan Doyle doesn't give you any clues, he just says he's very tall, he's gaunt, with a hooked nose and an eagle-like appearance. But basically that's it."

John is always looking to improve his skills

"In the original illustrations of Sherlock Holmes he had a straight pipe, but the meerschaum pipe actually came about in the first stage production, because a hook pipe is easier to project your voice over the top of. So now Holmes has to have a meerschaum pipe. So his image is a composite."

Never satisfied

Like many people with a creative streak within them, John says he is always striving to improve himself, despite his many achievements and accolades.

"You're not very objective when it comes to your own work and sometimes, something will perhaps just encapsulate a feeling and you think 'that's done something'," he admits.

"But, I tend to be very critical of what I've done, otherwise what would be the point of carrying on?

"You're always looking [to improve yourself] and that's what I'm talking about with the restlessness of the creative spirit. It's about never being satisfied."

John will be part of both the Burnham and Maldon Art Trails this summer, plus an exhibition of his paintings will be on display at the Hayletts Gallery in Maldon in June and July.